Comic Bits

Stand-up Margaret Cho takes more than her show on the road--she’s got some nifty portable gadgets with her too.

Comedian Margaret Cho has had a lot of ups and downs--including addictions and a disastrous sitcom--in her career, but even the worst instances have been fodder for stand-up routines that have won her a large and varied following.

Raised in San Francisco (her Korean-born parents are also a source for her comedy), Cho became hugely popular on the college circuit by the time she was in her early 20s. At one point, she did 300 shows in two years.

Her popularity led to the short-lived “All American Girl” TV show and then appearances in movies and numerous other television programs. In 1999, she toured with her one-woman autobiographical show, “I’m the One That I Want,” which also was filmed for release in theaters; the VHS and DVD versions will be released this fall.

Cho, 32, lives in Los Angeles. She is workshopping her new one-woman show, “The Notorious C.H.O.,” which will play at Universal Amphitheatre in September.

COMPUTER: I have a portable Sony Vaio that is very small. It’s really my very good friend, my lifeline, because I spend so much time on the road. I need it for e-mail--I think I check more frantically for e-mail than anyone in the world. I use it to communicate with friends all over the world--Thailand, Canada. It’s really important to me. It’s where a lot of my personal life happens.

Q. That sounds sad.

I use my digital life as an addition to being with people. Part of my work involves going into different communities and building up relationships, and then having to leave. With e-mail, I can keep up with these people, and I constantly do.

Q. Did you work in Thailand?

No, that’s where a group of friends I travel with are right now. We are going on a trip to Vietnam in the next couple of months--somewhere in the middle of my upcoming tour--and with e-mail everything is so much easier to plan.

Q. You also use the laptop for writing?

Yes. I wrote both my one-woman shows on the computer and the book version of “I’m the One That I Want.” Doing it on a computer has made organizing much easier because I’m a scattered person by nature--I would write things down all the time and then lose them. Now that I put them on the computer, I’ve got them. I keep everything.

Anyway, writing is some form of daily meditation for me.

HAND-HELD: I have not gotten one yet. I feel my laptop would be jealous. It feels like I would be cheating on it if I got some cute, young, trophy Palm Pilot.

BOOKMARKS: I mostly do a lot of shopping online. I’ve actually bought clothes from different vendors, especially a site [https://www.stopstaringclothing.com] that has these great 1950s fashions. They re-created the Marilyn Monroe dresses from “The Seven Year Itch” and “Niagara” that I ordered--they are really beautiful and reasonably priced. I’m pretty much outfitting the tour from there.

I’m also a sucker for Amazon.com--I always look at the “recommendations” for me based on what I bought in the past. It’s always health and beauty, weird sex and martial arts.

Q. Martial arts?

I practice taekwondo, a kind of Korean karate, and I am terrible at it. I go to class and get beat up by 14-year-old boys. But it’s a great workout and spiritually centering. It’s good for me to allow myself to be bad at something.

Q. Do you go to comedy sites online?

No, I really don’t. I just never think of it. I like to go to music sites, like Lloyd Cole’s [https://www.lloydcole.com] because he’s a great musician and I like the site. I also go to the site for Vaginal Davis [https://www.vaginaldavis.com], who’s opening for me on the tour. She’s phenomenal--an incredible artist, writer, doctor [of psychology] and drag queen.

I also go to the site for BBC America [https://www.bbcamerica.com] because I like to watch their shows.

Q. Do you use the Web to research travel destinations?

No, because we are usually traveling with guides. And I get to be surprised.

CELL PHONE: Absolutely. I have a Motorola that is tiny, and I use it all the time. But not when traveling in Asia because you can’t get good service in the Himalayas. It’s kind of a relief, but it’s also inconvenient. I want to call someone up and tell them what I’m looking at.

TECH TOYS: I have a Sony MiniDisc recorder that I use when I’m in comedy clubs and trying out new material. I am using it now while I’m workshopping the new show--it’s plugged right into the sound board.

HOME THEATER: No, I have a TV and a DVD player and an ancient VCR. I’m building a room onto my house that will be my library. I’ll have a room devoted to reading as opposed to a room for the TV.

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